The admins then use some of this money to pay promised ROIs for as long as new affiliates sign up.

Once affiliate recruitment dries up so does the ROI reserve.

When a predetermined threshold is reached, EtherLend’s admins pull a runner with what’s left.

Early EtherLend investors make a bit of money (mostly via recruitment of new investors). But same as any other Ponzi scheme, the reality of such scams is that the majority of participants eventually lose money.

A good case-study in the collapse of an ICO lending Ponzi scheme is BitConnect.

Launched in early 2017, a year later BitConnect’s admins did a runner and the public value of otherwise worthless BCC points crashed. This resulted in widespread investor losses.

DavorCoin was heavily promoted as a reload lending ICO Ponzi scam to BitConnect victims. DavorCoin also recently collapsed a few days ago.

The inevitable outcome of LendConnect will be no different. Those running EtherLend will make off with most of the money at the expense of their investors.